Motorhome/Toad vs Truck-Trailer/Chase Car

[RUSSELL5000]

I have been doing a lot of study on the motorhome vs truck-trailer approach to full-timing.

There is the issue of having a smaller vehicle to run around in - easily satisfied by choice of a suitable toad to go with the motorhome. With truck-trailer you have the tow vehicle to run around in; for us that would be a big dually truck: not so economical or convenient.

I have seen little mention of using a chase car with a truck-trailer. I should note that we would not take this approach for a particular intended trip such as going to Alaska. We would take this approach for what I envision as "regular" time: travel for a day or two, stay for a few weeks.

I note that my wife can drive truck-trailer as well as I can, so we can swap off driving.

Thanks.

[jnharley]

Be thought about getting a chase car but in the end, we enjoy each other's company even on a travel day so we will stick with our truck/5th wheel combo. If we want the temporary use of a car, we just rent one.

[Ductape]

MH. Truck in tow. Motorcycle in the truck bed. Kayaks on the truck.

No way would we travel separately. But many couples like the separate drive, just not us.

[RUSSELL5000]

Thanks to all. It sounds like lots of personal preference, but certainly is feasible.

We almost always have a chase car now when we just go camping. That is because we normally have kayaks along, and we need to have a return mechanism when we get to the other end on the river.

I would like to do a big trip or two when we retire and full-time, but even more I would like to slowly move around, staying between. In that scenario I don't foresee driving over 300 miles in a day, and rarely more than two days. That is when we would use the chase car.

I think the truck could be used in 99.9 percent of situations. It is just a smaller vehicle would be less costly and better suited to short trips.

[blangen]

DutchmenSport wrote:

blangen wrote:
Don't overlook the motorhome / chase car configuration. My wife likes to run free in the chase car and meet up when I'm stopped with the "house". There are many more opportunities for the car to get into retail locations like grocery and to-go restaurants while I cruise along in the motorhome to the next stop. When we go long distance, she flies and we ship the car. And, yes, depending on scheduling, there's a rental car at one end or the other but that works for us.

You also have the option to attach the chase car as a TOAD too. You have the best of all options then. If the wife want's to rest, you can then simply tow the car. If she want's to run around while you drive on, she can.

Since we didn't want to mess with the hardware, we bought an all-wheel drive and can't be towed. Nope, ours will only be a chase car.

Someone above mentioned communications and/or the ability to stay together. We both have hands-free phone and text capabilities so we communicate just as well as if we were side by side. We don't even try to stay on the same route as my truck Garmin may take me one way and her google maps may take the car another... but we easily meet up when we want.

[2gypsies1]

We full-timed 8 years with a 33' 5th wheel and a Dodge diesel. We absolutely hated it from day 1 - the size, smell and noise. Friends took us Jeeping with them and we fell in love with it. That's when we got a 40' motorhome, towing the Jeep. We absolutely loved it. We especially like the quietness and being able to creep along forest roads and not scaring away the critters.

Part of the enjoyment of traveling for us is having companionship and talking about the things we're seeing. Since we don't drive interstates having a companion for directions has helped a lot. GPSs are definitely not perfect when you're in the boonies. Any vehicle can drive to the grocery store.

It boils down to what kind of RVer/tourist you are. Do you mainly sit in campgrounds? Do you sitesee by driving secondary country roads? Do you drive gravel roads or wish you could get into the heart of the mountains or deserts by using rough two-tracks?

We scratched up our truck a lot and really didn't care because we enjoyed getting on gravel roads with vegetation at the edge of the road like in Big Bend Nat'l Park. So, yes, there are places a truck cannot go. It just depends what you want to see/do.

[Veebyes]

I'd like to know where some of these places are where you cannot take a truck. 9 seasons, over 150,000 miles, I have not found anywhere yet that the crew cab long box dually won't go. Those miles include roads like Mt Evans, CO. 14,000', Going to the Sun Highway, The Tail of the Dragon, Hwy 1 north of San Fransisco (towing), countless small old town centers in the East which, after all, are supplied by trucks bigger than a 1 ton.

Can't imagine driving my 1 ton at home in Bermuda where cars are limited in size to things barely bigger than a Toyota Yaris & only 1 car per household is permitted.

[chevyman2]

this is a typical conversation. It will always boil down to personal preference. The MH is always a bit more convienent. easier to drive in more harsh weather (note there is NO type of RV configuration that will be a real nice drive in snow, ice, or high winds). If you are going to be set up for long periods of time, the only "sensible" choice is a trailer. It is not good on any drivetrain to sit still for extended periods. However, if you drive all the time, you will be "wearing out" the MH drivetrain. Meaning it may be more expensive repairing/replacing certain mechanical parts on the MH, than it would be on a truck. It is certainly more costly to replace a MH than it would be to replace A truck, or A trailer. (Replacing truck and trailer at once might be about the same as replacing a MH though).

-----My only reasonable thought is this. Insurance. Yes. Insurance for truck and trailer is generally less than insurance for the MH alone. Not to mention insurance for the toad. OH yeah. Fuel mileage. Well that is about the same either way.

[cmeade]

For us we are not fulltimers yet but to keep mileage down on our Ram 3500 megacab 4x4 we bought a new 2015 VW Jetta diesel 4 months ago. It gets over 50 mpg on the road and has 3 yr 36k mi bumper to bumper warranty (yes it has the emission cheating program). We also got zero % for 6 yrs. Both vehicles in our fleet are diesel now so no chance of gas in the diesel tank and DW can scout ahead for easy fuel stops. Both vehicles have built in bluetooth so we plan to use our hands free to communicate. The Ram is 6 yrs old and has 56k mi and it will last us the rest of our lives. Replacement would be over $60k and we paid only $44k new.

[gotsmart]

See my signature. I drag a 2-seater. It's a grocery getter and keeps the rain off of my head. It also weighs only 1,800 lbs (US). I've taken it everywhere - even on NF roads (not a good idea). It has plenty of room in the back for groceries/supplies. Why a 2-seater? To shut up the moochers. When you're at a gathering at yours/some one's site... and everyone decides to go somewhere or to dinner... and a mooch says to you "You have room, why don't we take your car/truck?".

For years, even when I had my S&B home, I got hit on to be the driver of the group. I'm done with that. I have a nice little car that is super easy to tow. My 2009 is rated: 33mpg/city and 41mpg/hwy. I average 39 to 41/city and 50/hwy.

[Second_Chance]

We researched and talked about this a lot prior to going full-time. We posted on the Escapees and RV-Dreams forums and got lots of good feedback. As has been stated by previous posters, there is no right or wrong way. For us, since we already had the "chase car" and it was paid for, we decided (as was suggested) to try it for a year and see how it works out. Having the smaller car (a Toyota Corolla) has been invaluable in several situations: 1) driving 30 - 40 miles round trip every day while visiting family in the the Baltimore area; 2) driving into and parking in downtown Baltimore to visit another family member; 3) driving to and from medical appointments and surgery while back in our previous home area for almost a month; 3) scouting out campsites rather than getting into tight situations with a long rig; 4) and running around locally while spending over a month in southern New Mexico enjoying the holidays with family. We have also had a number of one or two night stays where the site was level enough to leave the trailer on the truck and just take the car to run errands or buy groceries (as mentioned above).

We also anticipate the car coming in handy when we head to the San Diego area next week and for sightseeing in Arizona on the way. My wife doesn't mind her alone time on travel days (we usually keep our drives between 4 and 6 hours and use two-way radios) so she can listen to her books on tape or her own music.

We're not even half-way through our first year, so the jury is still out - but so far, the "chase car" concept is working for us. I've also seen and talked to many full-timers for whom the motorhome (usually large DPs) and tow'd are working well (although those rigs are usually way out of our budget range).

Rob

[Nutinelse2do]

We have a DRW, a 33' fifth wheel, and a " chase car".

The inconvenience of having to drive through and try to park in little coastal towns, not being able to get into certain places, having to park far away from certain attractions, and the amount of fuel we were using, led us to start our calculations.

Truck... 12- 15mpg ( not towing ) vs car... 35-42mpg... Convenience... Priceless.

Our little Sonic had 32k miles on her when we got her, has a bumper to bumper 100k warranty.

Our calculations for having the car...: Including purchase price, registration, insurance, fuel, and maintenance make it a perfect wash. Mind you, this also includes the Stanadyne in the truck, less maintenance on the truck, etc. Also, it will keep the resale value of our very low mileage truck at the top end. That alone, will pay for the purchase price of the car.

We arent going to get a tow set up for the car because it won't pay for itself by the time we go to trade in in.

We keep in touch via UHF radios.
DH drives the truck and fifth wheel, and I drive the car. I usually stay behind him, and advise him of any trouble coming from the back, and do traffic breaks for him.. and visa versa. When we get near our RV Park, or stopping place for the night, I go ahead of him and check in. He has me go check out the sites, if we have a choice of sites, and it gives me the ability to keep our 55 foot rig out of any trouble ( turning around, low branches, etc. )

We have had this set up traveling through 8 States, and have never had to pay extra for the car, and that includes quite a few State Parks.

We usually only have to stabilize the fifth wheel and take a little weight off the truck when we park. We don't have to do a full blown disconnect, which also gives the appearance that we are in our rig, and it's not sitting empty inviting any troubles.

Obviously, the set up we have doesn't work for everyone, but we are ecstatic with our set up.

Feel free to PM me if you are interested in our financial breakdown spreadsheet.

[stickdog]

For us the chase car is the way to go. We fulltime and volunteer about 9 mos of the year at maybe three different locations. We use FRS units to communicate and as tailgunner DW can open up lane changes in heavy traffic. In the five years we've shaved 37,000 miles off the tow vehicle usage, fuel costs are a wash because of travel miles. We do enjoy the convenience of city driving and parking, never would have taken the truck into NYC as we did with our Focus.
For us the Focus was paid for and only had 80,000 miles on it so the cost is basic maintenance and insurance. My thought too is that diesels are not intended for light duty where they never get up to operating temps.

[Boxer_Lovers]

My wife drives the chase car. We enjoy extended stays and the car is handy to park or go off road (Subaru). Also I don't like leaving the car in storage for months on end without driving it. With cheap gas expense isn't an issue.

[stripit]

We started fulltime with just the truck and trailer, but it was a International MDT. After about 4 months we decided we needed a smaller car for shopping and site seeing. We bought a new PT Cruiser. That car got 24 mpg or more and the truck 7.5 so doing some math I figured we had to put about 95,000 miles on the car to be 'free' compared to the trucks costs. We ended up putting 130,000 miles on before selling it. We rarely traveled more than 300 miles on move days, so we were apart for about 6 hours. She and I kept in contact with CB radios and it worked great. We always started out with printed maps of where we were going and how to get there. Plus she was my blocker, allowing me to switch lanes easier than if she was not there. Sometimes the other drivers just don't want to let you slide over for whatever reason. Parking in RV parks was never an issue, sometimes the MDT had to park in a different location, but rarely. The PT could squeeze in places a larger vehicle could not. Yes there were added costs, of insurance and plates along with maintenance, but the benifits to us were worth it.